If I knew these five lessons before I start my first business, I would not have to suffer a lawsuit, a million dollar debt and wasted time. Read till the end. The last one is the most important one. It will save you many sleepless nights of fear, worry and anxiety. On people Don’t trust people so easily. Fact is when they want to work with you, they will promise the sun, moon and stars. But when things go south, they either disappear or play the blame game. So the smart thing to do is to make sure everything is written down in black and white. It may be awkward at the beginning to draft agreements with potential partners, but do it anyway. Contracts will protect you and your relationship with that partner. On money Learn how to look at your own financial statements. My mistake is to trust my partner to take care of all the finances. And when shit hits the fence with the finances, I have no one to blame but myself. Years later, I realise that revenue is vanity, profit is sanity and cash flow is reality! On hiring If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys. So cheap employees doesn’t mean good employees. As our business was growing rapidly, we need a lot of help we can get. But our mistake was hiring by availability, not capability. Just because someone applied doesn’t mean he/she is the best fit. Ins